140: This Firefighter Expanded his BBQ Business into a Successful Restaurant… Find Out How w/ Jason Szmurlo

Background on Jason Szmurlo of BBQ King Smokehouse:

Jason Szmurlo is the Owner and Founder of BBQ King Smokehouse. BBQ King Smokehouse has been feeding foodies flavor-packed BBQ food for over 8 years. His restaurant was built with two things in mind – to serve great BBQ just the way they like it, and to provide diners with a place to hang out. Jason has always had a passion for cooking great-tasting BBQ. He started the hobby by cooking food for his family and friends in his backyard. His food became a big hit. This led him to start offering catering services and doing pig roasts for clients. Later, he and his brother began entering different BBQ competitions. While they only cooked in a few events, they placed in the top 5 in all of them. Since opening the restaurant, Jason has received a lot of positive feedback about the food they serve as well as the atmosphere of their eatery.

Time-Stamped Show Notes:

[6:15] Jason Szmurlo is the owner of BBQ King Smokehouse, which is a full service barbecue restaurant that has a total of 70 employees and has over 6 million dollars in revenue.
[9:05] Jason gave the size and revenue of each of his restaurant.
[11:02] There are three things that listeners can learn from Jason being an experienced and successful entrepreneur.
[12:56] The entrepreneurial spirit of Jason started when he was still a young boy and it continued throughout high school.
[16:30] Jason got a job as an Executive Recruiter, wherein he recruited salespeople. He learned a lot from this job in terms of carrying himself.
[24:08] Jason tells the story of how he has gotten into the charcoal business.
[25:44] Using his own special strategy, Jason was able to differentiate himself from other charcoal businesses.
[35:50] After his charcoal business, Jason became a full-time fireman, and then he decided to build his own restaurant.
[38:36] When he was just starting to cook barbecues, his beef ribs tasted so bad he almost got sick and threw up.
[42:25] Jason bought the building and it took 2 years to fix and revamp it until it becomes a restaurant.
[49:41] Since Jason was working too much, his mother-in-law thought he was cheating on his wife.
[52:34] The opening day of his restaurant turned out to be pretty crazy for Jason.
[57:53] Jason offers a few tips for people who want to open their own restaurant.
[59:12] When he got the restaurant finally in control, he got a phone call from his manager that it was on fire.
[1:09:21] Jason talks about the hiring and interview process in his restaurant and how he manages his staff.
[1:12:01] Jason offers a few words of advice for people who want to be an entrepreneur.

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Fabulous 4 Questions:

📖 📚 Favorite Book(s)? I have not read a book in years except a unicorn named sparkle to my daughters 1st grade class
🙌😎 Favorite Amazon.com purchase? Shit that keeps me from going to the store but recently my insta pot
🌱💸 Favorite Tool that's GROWN your Business? My iphone and the calemdar, facebook, instagram, and the internet
💭💡 BIGGEST Challenge keeping your Business from GROWING? I cant cloan myself. Getting people to work who are not lazy and are just good people

Key Point from the Interview:

“My dad told me something really smart, if everyone’s your customer, two things are wrong, you’re too cheap or you’re fooling yourself. It’s the truth, you’re never going to get everybody to be your customer.”

Resources Mentioned:

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